A Letter from the THINK Organizers
January 25, 2008
Dear THINK Applicants,
It has been an absolute pleasure immersing ourselves in your adventures over the past two weeks. We have been impressed by some of your well-organized applications, your passion for your projects, and the sincerity shown through your applications! We read your anecdotes of experiences or people who inspired your projects, your frustrating moments of failures, your joy beyond words at the moment of triumphs, and your exciting discoveries of better solutions and your hidden strengths. Reading about your endeavors has brought us, the organizing team and many of the judges, memories of our own trying experiences. We share your unresting drive to improve your environment, your stubbornness in following through with your interests despite all the oppositions from your surroundings, your realization of the power of science, your creative inspirations and your care for your community! We are delighted to see such promising youth beginning to bring about positive changes to our lives!
Many of you wrote about how observations of daily life inspired your projects: the various kinds of waves constantly propagating through space making communication and illumination possible, the motion of the airplane wings, allergies made worse by the air pollution, the painfulness of wearing the ballet pointe shoes, and much more. Isn't it exciting when you start to percieve the beautiful and subtle connections between science and nature, technology and our daily lives? Your experiences speak for the wide spectrum of problems yet to be solved. Observe, for life is a great source of inspiration and innovation.
A desire to learn and improve is precious. We were deeply touched by an application we recieved from India: "My intention of submitting this project of mine is not to win any prize and I do know that I am not eligible because of my citizenship. I am submitting these two projects of mine to get feedback on my hard work from the people who have been my sources of inspiration throughout." Work for the sake of learning and serving the community. You will or may have found that many resources are out there to help students with a heart set on learning. Hence, seek and create opportunities for yourselves. Now more than ever is a prime time to build your knowledge!
"Winner" is, after all, an instantaneous title made only for few. We hope you will not define yourselves based on the result of the competition, but this self-fulfilling learning experience that has helped you achieve a better understanding of yourselves, your interests, your potentials, your strengths and weaknesses, and your relationships with society.
The judging process was difficult and competitive for determining the grand prize winners this year. The greatest challenge lies in evaluating a home-grown project versus a project conducted in a research center. A project carried out independently excels in its creativity but lacks a solid technical foundation usually ensured by lab facilities, and it's generally the other way around for projects conducted with proper facilities. Remember, THINK's mission is to encourage students like you to seek mentorship and support from society in order to carry out your original ideas developed through your interactions with the community for the benefit of mankind. It is our earnest wish that you will learn the skills necessary to achieve both creative and technically sound work, at the same time acknowledge and appreciate the collaboration between the various sectors of society!
Finally, congratulations to all of you! To have coped with this year's timeline and prepared all this information given such short notice, your hard work, enthusiasm, and your willingness to try are praiseworthy. More importantly, congratulations on embarking on the exciting journey of science, technology, and community service! So long as you keep learning and trying, the many essential qualities for research and engineering that you have developed from this experience will take you quite far as you run your course.
Thank you! The process of organizing THINK 2008 has been a heartfelt testimony of the wonderful collaborations among different MIT TechFair committees, MIT students and professors, MIT offices, our sponsor Thomson West, and motivated high school students like you! On behalf of MIT TechFair and the THINK Team, we deeply appreciate everyone's great support for this educational endeavor in its first year and all your valuable feedback regarding improvements for next year!
Best Regards,
MIT THINK Team 2008
